


Many names in history (none of them are ours)

by givebackmylifecas



Category: La casa de papel | Money Heist (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Everyone Lives/Nobody Dies, Alternate Universe - The Old Guard (Movie 2020) Fusion, Canon-Typical Violence, Established Relationship, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Getting Together, Happy Ending, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Soulmates, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-07-23
Updated: 2021-01-06
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:01:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 13,210
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25471300
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/givebackmylifecas/pseuds/givebackmylifecas
Summary: It never gets any easier. Martín watches Andrés get gunned down, chest riddled with bullets. Nairobi goes next, her hand reaching for her gun before she drops next to where Rio and Tokyo are already lying. Denver and Stockholm go at the same time – they almost always do – and Helsinki hits the ground right before Martín does. Just because they come back to life doesn’t mean the dying doesn’t hurt anyway.In other words, an Old Guard berlermo au of the first mint heist
Relationships: Berlin | Andrés de Fonollosa/Palermo | Martín Berrote
Comments: 45
Kudos: 127





	1. death by a thousand cuts

**Author's Note:**

> like everyone (?) it seems at the moment i am obsessed with the old guard and especially nick&joe so it inspired me to write this. i don't think you need to have seen the film to read this, but you should because it's great!
> 
> TWs for... well death (it is always temporary!!!), canon-typical violence, canon-typical language
> 
> Title from the Richard Siken poem "Little Beast"

**Madrid 2016**

It never gets any easier. He watches Andrés get gunned down, chest riddled with bullets. Nairobi goes next, her hand reaching for her gun before she drops next to where Rio and Tokyo are already lying. Denver and Stockholm go at the same time – they almost always do – and Helsinki hits the ground right before Martín does.

Just because they come back to life doesn’t mean the dying doesn’t hurt anyway. He never remembers what it’s like. He just knows one minute he’s there, the next he’s gone. Coming back to life is like drowning, gasping for breath that takes too long to reach his lungs.

He retches, spitting not one, but two bullets onto the road in front of him. To his left, Nairobi twitches and he’s flooded with relief that he isn’t alone, not this time. Not anymore. Tokyo and Rio start moving in front of him, hands reaching for each other.

The police officers have their backs to them. They’ve done their job, stopped the robbers trying to take over the truck headed to the mint. If Rio’s done his job, they’ll only just have realised that their radios aren’t working.

Martín gets his arms under him, more bullets popping out of his chest as he kneels. He looks to his right, sees Denver and Stockholm checking on each other, sees Helsinki scowling as he wipes blood off his face.

Andrés appears in front of him, one hand stretched out for Martín to grab. Martín takes it gratefully, lets him pull him to his feet. Andrés doesn’t hug him like Denver and Stockholm are doing, but one hand traces from his elbow down to his wrist. His long fingers remain there, checking Martín’s pulse the way he always does – as if him standing, bullet wounds already healed weren’t enough proof that he’s alive.

“Okay?” Martín asks and Andrés nods.

There’s a gasp and a shout and he turns to see that the police officers have noticed that they’re all on their feet again. One of them pulls his gun, pointing it right at Andrés’ chest.

Andrés smiles and Martín finds it hard to believe that it hasn’t changed in the last four centuries.

“Gentlemen, I would recommend you all drop your weapons. As you’ve seen, they aren’t exactly effective,” Andrés says, his voice smooth and even despite the fact that he still has his own brains drying in his hair.

“I don’t understand,” one of the police officers mumbles, his face white as a sheet. “You were dead.”

“And now we aren’t,” Andrés says as if he’s discussing the weather. “Now put the guns down, or we’ll draw our own and you’ll realise that just because we can’t die, doesn’t mean we’re unwilling to kill.”

The guns go clattering to the ground and Martín breathes a sigh of relief. He didn’t really want to die twice in the space of ten minutes.

“Good, now open the back of the truck please,” Andrés says and the policemen do as they’re told. There’s nothing important in there as far as they know, just paper.

Martín turns to look at the rest of the gang. “Everyone clean yourselves up and then get changed. Now! We don’t have any more time to waste.”

The gang nod and Helsinki grabs the bag full of towels and water that thankfully someone had the foresight to bring along. He keeps an eye on the police officers and guards, but they’re all too scared to look at any of the gang let alone try and put up a fight.

When everyone is dressed, Andrés comes over to him and straightens his uniform for him.

“Ready?” he asks, as if they haven’t spent years planning every minute detail.

Martín nods. “As we’ll ever be.”

Andrés smiles. “I’ll see you in the mint.”

Martín wants to kiss him, but now isn’t the time. Not when they need to be setting an example for the others, when Sergio already doesn’t trust him, when it would just expose a potentially exploitable weakness to the police officers who aren’t currently tied up in the back of the truck.

“See you there,” he says and gets into one of the police cars, resolutely not watching Andrés get into the other.

* * *

**Barcelona 1578**

His mother would say ‘I told you so’ if she could see him now. She’d always warned him about the drinking, the brawling, the men. It wasn’t even Martín's fault this time. He hadn’t started anything, wasn’t that drunk, just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time.

He’d been headed to the bar for another flagon of ale when a fight broke out. The guy in front of him had flung himself to the side and the knife intended for him ended up in Martín’s belly instead.

In all the confusion, no one had even really noticed. The wound was deep, the blood already soaking his shirt. He’s dying, he knows that much. Not much sense in trying to find someone to try and fix him up anymore either.

At least if he’s going to die, it won’t be in this shitty bar. He drags himself towards the open door, through which he can see out into the alley, which seems almost deserted. He spills out onto the street, blood making his hands slippery as he tries to brace himself on the side of the building.

He slides onto the ground around the corner from the main entrance and sends thanks to the god he doesn’t even really believe in that his mother is no longer alive to hear of him dying like this. Alone in a dirty street next to a disreputable tavern. Not exactly a hero’s death, not like his father, one of the conquistadors who fell in the new world.

He stares up at the starry sky, his breaths already becoming harder to draw, lungs refusing to cooperate. He’s not exactly been trying to stay alive but dying hurts more than he thought it would. Eventually his hands go numb and he stops trying to hold himself together.

He’s thirty-seven when he dies and he leaves behind no one who would care enough to mourn.

-

He wakes up. He wakes up and his hands are still covered in his own blood, his shirt caked in it. He aches like he’s been trampled by an ox and when his hands go to his stomach, to check the wound that somehow hasn’t killed him yet, he finds nothing but smooth, new skin.

It’s not possible, it isn’t. He didn’t dream being stabbed, he remembers what it felt like, remembers trying to stop his guts from spilling out onto the ground.

He turns to the side and retches until there’s nothing but bile coming up. He pulls himself to his feet, hands still traversing the expanse of new skin, looking for any trace that a deadly wound had once been there. He staggers home in the dark, hoping no one will see him soaked in his own blood and assume he took someone else’s life.

-

He tries to forget what happened, tries to blame it on bad ale, on hitting his head, on a hallucination. It almost works. He goes back to working at the blacksmith’s and drinking in bars and having sex with men whose name he can’t remember the next day, except he can’t forget dying.

At night he dreams of death. Not his own, but the deaths of men he doesn’t even know. Always the same men. One has a dark beard and intelligent eyes. He screams when he dies. Every time. No matter how many times or how he dies, he screams and Martín wakes with his throat raw and his eyes stinging. The other one doesn’t speak, he holds his head high, smile on his lips. His eyes are flat and cold when the noose is wrapped around his neck and when the axe buries itself in his head and when the dagger finds its way to his throat.

Martín doesn’t know who they are. Maybe they’re spirits. Maybe they’re ghosts. He hates them and he hates Barcelona. He can no longer stay in the city and so he leaves. He packs up his relatively few belongings, collects an extra pouch of silver from the smith who is sad to see him go and he leaves.

-

He makes it halfway to Valencia before bandits attack him. He defends himself as best he can, but soon he finds himself with a sword through his chest and lungs full of blood.

They steal his horse and his sword and his silver and they leave him to die.

He curses them as he dies, wishing plagues and misfortunes upon their families until he chokes to death on his own blood.

He wakes again in the middle of the night, chest healed and copper in his mouth. It’s the second time he dies at someone else’s hand and the last time he lets the one who murders him live.

* * *

**Valencia 1596**

He dies again and again. He almost makes a game of it. How many of the dock workers and sailors can he piss off before they kill him? He gets good at it. His murderers are usually still standing over his body when he wakes again. They never expect it – why should they?

Dead men usually don’t get back up for revenge.

They usually scream too. No matter how big or brave or strong they are. They are terrified when he gets to his feet and takes their lives from them. A couple piss themselves. It’s disgusting but he gets used to it.

Once they’re dead and certain not to get back up again, he fleeces them – taking anything of value – and then he runs. Back to the house he has called his own for the last twenty years.

Twenty years of dying, of coming back to life. Twenty years of nightmares about other people’s deaths, of screaming himself awake, of being haunted by the smile on the dark eyed man’s face when he dies. Twenty years of not aging and having to push away anyone who might get close enough to notice.

Twenty years alone.

* * *

**Palermo 1630**

There’s someone following him. He doesn’t know if they’re not very good at following people or just don’t care enough to try and stay quiet, but he’s been aware of them for a while now. He shrugs to himself. He spent the last of his money on the bottle of liquor in his hand and it’s not like they can kill him.

“I’d like to see them try,” he mutters to himself and then laughs drunkenly at his own joke.

The moon is mostly covered by clouds tonight and there aren’t many people still out and about, most of the respectable ones already at home with their wives and children.

Martín has neither – not that he was ever really that interested in women or children. But someone to come home to would be nice, even platonically, just so he isn’t so alone.

It’s his birthday today. His hundredth birthday to be exact. He’d told the sailor that earlier, when he let him fuck him. The guy had just laughed and asked him what he’d been drinking.

The world tilts a little and he braces himself against the wall of one of the houses in the street where he's mostly sure he lives. He contemplates throwing up and decides against it, hoisting himself upright to try and figure out which house he lives in.

He’s just decided it’s probably the one with the shutters still open, when someone grabs him and starts dragging him down the nearest side street.

“I don’t have any money,” he slurs over his shoulder. “And if you’re going to kill me, please let me take my jacket off first. It was really expensive and the blood will be a bitch to get out.”

“Silence,” the man hisses and Martín frowns because he said it in Spanish and not Italian like Martín had been speaking.

He’s shoved up against a wall, face pressed against the stone.

“What do you want from me?” Martín groans.

The pressure on his back is suddenly gone and because he’d always been foolhardy, he turns to look at his assailant. There’s two of them, unless he drank enough to see double.

He raises the bottle that he somehow held onto, to his mouth and has it promptly slapped out of his hand. It goes clattering to the ground and shatters.

He whines. “Hey, that was my alcohol. And it’s my birthday! What the fuck do you want from me?”

It’s too dark to see their face properly, but he’s familiar with the flash of reflected light in the slightly shorter one’s hand – he’s holding a knife.

Martín rolls his eyes. “Let’s get this over with then.”

“Is this really necessary Andrés?” the taller one asks and Martín wishes they’d stop dithering and just get it over with.

The one with the knife steps forward and stabs the blade right into Martín’s chest. The clouds in the sky above them suddenly shift enough for the moon to illuminate the face of his killer.

Martín gasps and it’s not from the pain. He reaches a shaking hand up to the man’s face.

“I dreamt of you,” he whispers. “Every night, I’ve dreamt of you.”

The man - Andrés the other one called him - smiles. “I dreamt of you too.”

Then he raises the knife again and slits Martín’s throat.

* * *

**Paris 1834**

Martín sits bolt upright, gasping desperately for breath. Beside him, Andrés is doing the same, hands immediately reaching for Martín, sliding over his chest, feeling his racing heart.

“You too?” Martín asks and Andrés nods, already reaching for paper and a pencil.

Across the room, the door bursts open and Mirko, Ágata, and Sergio come running in, all looking equally terrified.

“Tell me what you remember,” Sergio says, collapsing into the armchair by the window, oil lamp in his hand illuminating the room and throwing shadows across his face.

Martín exchanges a look with Mirko, who wraps an arm around Ágata.

“There was two of them,” Martín says quietly. “That’s never happened before.”

“It hasn’t?” Ágata asks. “What about you two?” she points at Martín and Andrés, still curled around each other despite Andrés’ furious sketching.

“Martín is six hundred years younger than me,” Andrés says, not bothering to look up.

Ágata turns to look at Sergio who shrugs. “I died twenty years after Andrés did. We had the same mother.”

“I thought you knew this?” Martín asks. He corrects Andrés sketch absentmindedly. “Her hair was longer than that.”

Ágata shakes her head and looks at Sergio. “I knew about you being brothers – I just thought Martín had been with you the whole time.”

“Does it matter?” Andrés asks, moving on to sketching the man.

Sergio clears his throat. “No. Now tell me what you remember.”

“A man and a woman,” Mirko says. “They were together when they died.”

Martín covers Andrés’ knee with one of his hands to hide how much he’s shaking. Andrés looks up at him and leans his head against Martín’s shoulder in a display of comfort before going back to his sketch.

“They burned,” Martín says and he sees his pain reflected in Ágata’s eyes.

Mirko sniffs. “It looked French.”

Sergio nods in agreement.

“I think it was here,” Martín says. “In Paris.”

“I think so too,” Andrés agrees with him, putting down his pencils. “Here.”

Sergio accepts the sketch from Andrés, looking at the faces that had haunted them all in their sleep that night. A woman with curly hair and a man with a square jaw, their arms wrapped around each other as their house went up in flames around them.

“Was it this bad when you dreamt of me?” Ágata asks.

Mirko nods. “Yes.”

She looks at Andrés. “Did you dream of Martín?”

“Every night for sixty-two years,” Andrés says and Martín tightens his grip on his knee.

“I thought the two months before you found me were bad,” Ágata says quietly.

Sergio gets to his feet. “So, we’ll go and find these new ones tomorrow morning. There’s no point searching now, especially if their house is still ablaze.”

“Tomorrow,” Andrés agrees. “We should all try and get some more rest.”

Sergio ushers Ágata and Mirko out and Martín watches them go with a murmured good night.

Martín waits for the door to close before turning and curling into Andrés’ waiting arms. He presses his face to his neck, letting the older man rub his hands up and down his back.

“Are you alright, mi vida?” Andrés asks and Martín nods.

“I thought nothing could be worse than you and Sergio – I watched you die so many times, so many different ways, but…”

“But this was different,” Andrés finishes.

Martín sighs. “They were just so scared. For each other, more than for themselves, and I just… What if that’s us one day?”

Andrés kisses the top of his head, hands gentle as they trace his spine. “They are going to survive this just as we always have. But if we are to eventually lose this gift and be parted from the living world for good, then I hope it is together.”

“Me too,” Martín says and lets Andrés drag him into a kiss that feels a lot more desperate than the ones he’d sent him to sleep with hours earlier.

“Promise me we’ll always be together?” Andrés asks against Martín’s lips.

“Always,” he replies.

-

They wake to wild banging on the front door of their house. Martín is on his feet in an instant, stumbling into trousers with Andrés close behind him. He grabs his pistol and runs down the creaky wooden stairs barefoot, only stopping when Andrés grabs him and forces his own body in front of Martín’s.

Andrés is armed with a wicked looking dagger and Martín can hear Mirko’s heavy footsteps on the stairs behind him, which makes him feel a little better. Two hundred years of being with Andrés, of watching him die and dying next to him, and he’s still afraid of losing him.

Andrés opens the door to find the couple from their dreams standing in front of them. They’re both barefoot, in ill-fitting garments that are obviously not theirs. The man’s face is streaked with soot and the woman’s hair is coated with so much ash that the distinctive golden colour Martín remembers from his dream is almost completely covered.

“Who are you?” the man asks in accented French, looking ready to strangle Andrés with his bare hands, making Martín step forwards protectively.

Andrés remains calm. “Who are you? Since you’re the ones who have rudely turned up on my doorstep.”

“We dreamed of you,” the woman says. “We burned and we woke up in the rubble of our house and we dreamed of you and this house. We’ve been walking for hours trying to find it.”

There are more footsteps behind Martín and he turns to see Sergio, already dressed.

“You had better let them in,” Sergio says.

When the young couple look uncertain, Martín reaches around Andrés and pushes down the hand that is still holding the knife.

“Let them in, Andrés,” he says.

The woman smiles hesitantly when Andrés steps back and she and her husband walk into the house.

“My name is Mónica,” she says when the front door has closed behind them. “This is my husband Daniel.”

Martín and Andrés lead the way into the drawing room where Sergio is waiting with the others. “I’m Martín. This is Andrés, his brother Sergio, and our friends Mirko and Ágata.”

“It’s nice to meet you,” Mónica says, nervously brushing down her dress.

“Enough with the introductions!” Daniel says. “Someone explain what the fuck is going on. Why aren’t we dead?”

“And why did we dream of you?” Mónica adds, clasping Daniel’s hand in both of hers.

Martín shrugs and goes to join Andrés on the chaise-longue. “We don’t know,” he says as Andrés’ arm settles around his waist.

“What Martín is trying to say,” Sergio says when Daniel looks ready for a brawl. “Is that we’re all like you. We can’t die. Haven’t been able to for a long time.”

Daniel’s jaw drops. “How long?”

“About a hundred and seventy years for me,” Mirko says, drawing Daniel’s attention.

Ágata sighs. “I’ve been with them for eighty-three.”

“Andrés is the oldest,” Sergio says. “He was born in the late ninth century. I was born a few decades after him. Martín became immortal in the sixteenth century.”

“Impossible,” Mónica says.

Andrés smiles. “Extremely. And yet here we are. Here you are, after having burned to death in a house fire.”

“You’re lying,” Daniel says and Martín knows what’s going to happen before it does.

Andrés grabs his pistol off him and shoots Daniel straight through the head. Mónica screams and Martín groans because cleaning the blood up is going to take most of the morning.

“I always forget how much longer the first times take,” Andrés muses and Martín sighs.

“Did you really have to be so aggressive?” Sergio demands as Ágata tries to comfort a sobbing Mónica.

Suddenly Daniel draws a gasping breath and sits up, hair still matted with blood.

Mónica shrieks and throws herself at him. He’s shaking as he wraps his arms around her.

“Believe us now?” Andrés asks and Daniel nods, face still white.

Monica cradles his head to her chest and glares at Andrés. “What about the dreams?”

“It’s so we can find each other,” Sergio says. “At least that’s what we think. It usually takes longer than this to find the new ones. They stop once you’re found.”

Mónica and Daniel exchange an incredulous glance. “What now?” Daniel asks. “What do we do? We lost everything in that fire.”

“You’re with us now,” Mirko says solemnly.

Ágata nods. “We’re a family, we look after each other.”

“For how long?” Mónica looks scared, but nevertheless determined and Martín decides he likes her.

Andrés squeezes Martín’s waist. “Forever.”


	2. too close for comfort

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i tried so hard to make this fluffy and yet here we are
> 
> TWs: canon-typical violence, references to canon-typical torture, referenced suicide attempt, implied smut, period-typical homphobia, referenced historical homophobia, temporary character death

**London 1636**

“Your brother’s an asshole,” Martín slurs as he watches Andrés seduce yet another duchess.

Sergio, who’s considerably less drunk than Martín and therefore still able to hold himself upright, sighs. “What do you want me to say?”

Martín scowls and gulps down more wine. “Nothing. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

“Wait,” Sergio grabs at Martín’s doublet. “Where are you going?”

Martín surveys the ballroom, locks eyes with a minor aristocrat whom he’s met before and winks at him. Baronet Acton flushes, but raises his goblet at Martín, then heads out of the doors and onto the terrace.

“With him,” he says and Sergio groans. “What?”

Sergio looks over at Andrés who is still talking to the duchess. “He’ll be unbearable if you go with that lordling.”

“Maybe he should have thought of that two years ago,” Martín says bitterly and makes towards the terrace where the baronet is waiting.

“Sir,” he says cockily, when he emerges into the night air to find the baronet pacing just out of sight of the windows.

“Señor,” Baronet Acton replies, accent butchering the word terribly. “Would you care to take a stroll through the gardens? I’ve heard they’re rather pleasant this time of night.”

Martín grins and inclines his head. “Lead on.”

He listens as the baronet makes small talk, remarking on other guests in whom Martín has little to no interest and their families. When they’re far enough from the party to only hear faint strains of music, Acton drops all attempts at conversation and drags Martín off the well-maintained path and behind a hedge. Martín lets himself be manhandled onto the ground, fumbling with the other man’s doublet as Acton works on unfastening Martín’s breeches.

“If I have grass stains on my back after this, I’m sending my clothes to your house to be laundered,” Martín pants against the other man’s mouth.

Acton succeeds in unlacing Martín’s breeches and starts on his own. “If you don’t have grass stains after this, I clearly haven’t done my job right.”

Martín laughs, wrapping his legs around the other man’s hips. “Oh, I like you.”

-

When they stumble back towards the ballroom, Martín is definitely going to have to get his doublet cleaned – and his breeches too.

“Señor,” Acton says, departing with a smile when they re-enter the crowded room.

Martín smirks salaciously before deciding to locate more wine. He’s just a had a servant pour him a new goblet when Sergio appears at his side with the air of a nervous rabbit.

“What?” he asks, unimpressed, but before Sergio can speak, Andrés is storming towards him.

He grabs Martín’s arm just above the elbow and starts dragging him out of the ballroom. Martín knows he can’t make a scene, not while they’re surrounded by English aristocrats whom they’re still planning to exploit, so he keeps a fake smile plastered to his face. The minute the heavy doors are closing behind them, leaving them alone in the dimly lit hallway, Martín wrenches his arm away from Andrés.

“Get your fucking hands off me,” he spits, stepping out of Andrés’ reach and walking away.

Andrés follows, grabbing Martín and shoving him against the wall, eyes almost black, face mostly in shadows – almost exactly like the night they met.

“What were you doing with that English ponce?” Andrés demands, fingers digging tightly into Martín’s shoulders.

Martín’s lip curls. “What do you think? Now get off me.”

“No,” Andrés says obstinately.

“No? I’m not joking Andrés, get off me or I’ll –“

“Or you’ll what?” Andrés interrupts.

Martín stares at him, desperate to get away, to never be this close to Andrés again. “Why can’t you just let me be?” he asks and something in Andrés’ gaze softens.

He moves one hand from Martín’s shoulder and carefully cups the side of his face. “Do you really want me to?”

“No,” Martín admits, the confession forcing its way past his clenched teeth. “But you don’t want me the way I want you. You made that very clear in Munich.”

“That was two years ago,” Andrés says, thumb tracing a path from the corner of Martín’s eye down to his cheekbone.

Against his instincts, Martín leans into the touch. “So what, you’re saying things have changed?”

“Maybe they have,” Andrés says, a hint of a smile on his lips.

Martín leans in, only for Andrés to pull away. “Clearly not,” he says bitterly, pushing Andrés’ hand off his face.

“Not when any one of those powdered idiots could come out and see us, cariño. Not when we still need them,” Andrés says and Martín’s traitorous heart fills with hope.

“You mean…” he trails off, afraid to speak in case it shatters the moment.

Andrés leans in, so close his lips brush Martín’s ear. “I mean that we should get a carriage back to the house right now.”

He pulls away, a wicked smile on his handsome face and Martín is powerless to do anything but nod and follow Andrés through the manor and to where their carriage is waiting.

“What about Sergio?” Martín asks when he climbs into the carriage after Andrés.

Andrés shuts the door and firmly draws the curtains. “What about him?” he asks and then he’s pressing Martín back against the seat, both hands in his hair, lips locked in a frantic kiss.

“Andrés,” Martín gasps, pulling away as the carriage lurches into motion. “If anyone sees!”

Andrés grins. “What are they going to do? Kill us?”

Martín lets out a hiccupping laugh, then pulls Andrés back towards him.

* * *

**Madrid 2016**

Martín can hear the hostages murmuring amongst each other, even with guns trained on them. They’re confused, he knows, trying to work out why they aren’t just taking the money and running.

Martín stands between Rio and Tokyo, they each have a bag of cash in their hands. It’s more money than Martín in his very, very long life has ever held in one go. There’s a moment where he considers it, where he thinks about grabbing the cash and Andrés and running.

But that would be selfish. It isn’t just him and Andrés and Sergio any more. They have a family to look after, a family that they can look after for the foreseeably endless future if they pull off this heist - a family that will no longer have to fight for survival.

The police arrive and they step outside and then suddenly everything goes sideways. All because Tokyo seems to have forgotten that it doesn’t matter. if the police shoot at Rio, since he will always get back up again.

Rio goes down and Tokyo goes storming towards the police officers, firing bullets that these men will not recover from. Martín sprints after her, firing at the ground in a poor attempt to keep the police as far away as possible.

He grabs her, starts shoving her back up the stairs, all while she’s yelling about them hurting Rio.

“He’ll be fine, for fuck’s sake!” Martín yells, over the sound of returning fire. “Rio will get back up again, even if they cut his head off!”

“They hurt him!” she yells back.

Martín drops his gun and grabs her around the waist, pulling her back into the mint. “It doesn’t matter! He’ll heal, they won’t and the Professor said no casualties!”

Tokyo is still struggling against him, but she finally stops firing her gun. Martín pushes her through the doors and goes back to get Rio, who is still unconscious by the looks of him.

He drags him into the mint, ignoring the bullet that hits his left thigh, fired by the police officer that Tokyo left standing.

He has just opened his mouth to tell Helsinki to close the doors when he dies.

-

He wakes and he’s in an alcove away from the hostages with Andrés kneeling over him. He takes a shuddering breath, gasping for the air he’s sorely missed, and sits up. He can hear a bullet dropping to the ground and then Andrés’ arms are around him, holding him so tight he thinks his ribs might crack.

“Fuck,” he chokes, pressing his face to Andrés’s shoulder. “What happened?”

Andrés’s hands move, one pressing to his jugular, the other over his heart. “Headshot,” he says as he feels Martín’s erratic pulse and rabbiting heart.

Martín kisses him, trying to rid himself of the taste of coppery blood and his own death.

“Rio?” he asks, when they pull apart.

“Didn’t even die, just passed out,” Andrés says, his expression murderous.

Martín shakes his head. “Fucking newbies. What’s happening with Tokyo?”

Andrés shuffles away and returns with a towel and a bottle of water. “The Professor said he’d take care of it, but if she pulls something like that again, I’m tying her to a cart and sending her out to the police.”

“Andrés, we won’t allow anyone to be captured!” Martín admonishes as Andrés wets the towel and starts daubing at the blood on his face.

Andrés shrugs and Martín knows there’s no talking to him right now. Instead, he lets Andrés clean the blood off his face, the brains out of his hair, until the towel is probably irrevocably stained and Martín feels somewhat human again.

“We have to go back to the hostages,” Martín says when Andrés finishes and seems content to just sit on the ground next to him.

Andrés smooths Martín’s damp hair out of his face. “I know, just… let’s stay here a moment, alright?”

Martín nods, letting Andrés curl an arm around him and lean them both back against the wall. He takes Andrés' free hand in his, interlacing their fingers.

“Alright?” he asks, pressing a kiss to the back of Andrés’ hand.

Andrés nods. “Yes, you just… you took longer this time.”

“Well, you know head shots,” Martín says casually. “They take longer.”

“True, but –“

“But you were worried,” he finishes for Andrés who nods. “I told you, I’m not going anywhere without you.”

The corners of Andrés’ mouth twitch into a smile, one slightly faster than the other, just as they have for the last four centuries. “Is that a threat or a promise?”

Martín grins. “As always, it’s both. Now come on, I think if you try hard enough, you can get that Arturo guy to piss himself.”

Andrés laughs, head thrown back and pulls Martín into a kiss that would be deemed inappropriate at most times, let alone in the middle of a heist.

“I love you, Martín.”

* * *

**Prague 1895**

Andrés is asleep with his head in Martín’s lap when Daniel and Mónica return, Mirko and Ágata close behind them. They enter the drawing room as a group, talking loudly enough to wake the dead – but not Andrés who just sighs in his sleep and turns so his face is more firmly pressed against Martín’s stomach.

Martín hushes them violently, one hand curled around the back of Andrés’ neck and they have the good grace to look guilty as they settle onto the divans and armchairs scattered around the room.

Sergio sighs from where he’s seated at his desk and exchanges a tired look with Martín that has guilt roiling in his gut. It’s his fault, that both Sergio and Andrés are so tired, that the others are having to tiptoe around the house. He was the one who couldn’t take it anymore, he was the one who was found in a bathtub with water as red as the setting sun that Andrés tried to paint. He was the one who had begged for Andrés to let him find a way out of their hellishly long lives.

He’s the reason that Andrés only sleeps in fits and starts, too afraid that he’ll wake up and find Martín gone. He’s the reason Sergio has had to sit with them most days since the incident.

“Sorry,” Daniel says quietly, eyes flicking down to Andrés’ prone form.

Martín attempts a smile. “It’s alright.”

“Where have you been?” Sergio asks, stiltedly attempting to start a conversation.

“We went to the university,” Ágata says, unable to keep the smile off her face.

Martín huffs. “You mean you went drinking.”

Mirko laughs. “Well, yes.”

“But we met the most amazing students,” Mónica says, eyes bright. “There was this one, he was studying art and philosophy and literature and he showed us some of the poems he was working on.”

Andrés makes a snuffling noise and everyone freezes, but when he doesn’t move, Martín just strokes his hair and gestures for Mónica to continue.

“Well, Ágata and Mirko’s German is better than mine, but the way he writes about the world… it’s amazing,” she says.

“Do you think he’ll be someone who’s remembered one day?” Daniel asks and Martín shrugs.

“He might be,” Sergio says. “We never know who we meet, that in the future might be seen as a great influence on history.”

This time, Martín’s smile is more genuine. He remembers Andrés showing him paintings done by what by now are known as the Renaissance masters, the sketches he treasures that are probably worth an insurmountable amount of money.

“Well, I’m sure he will be,” Ágata says firmly.

Sergio nods in affable agreement. “I’m sure,” he’s silent for a moment before turning to Martín. “What was the name of that poet who liked you and Andrés so much? Who was told his poetry was obscene?”

Martín laughs, quietly, still wary of waking Andrés. “Walt Whitman,” he says and Sergio nods.

Daniel frowns. “Why was it obscene?”

“He was like us,” Martín says, gesturing at himself and Andrés. “And he wrote about it.”

Ágata sighs. “Reckless, like Oscar Wilde.”

“Brave,” Mirko says quietly and Martín thinks of the ongoing trial – news of which has reached them even here – and nods.

“If it was good enough for the Greeks,” Andrés mumbles against Martín’s shirt and every head in the room turns to look at him.

Martín runs a hand through Andrés’ hair, pushing it away from his face. “Of course, now you decide to join the conversation, mi amor,” he teases and Andrés yawns.

“Wasn’t interesting until now,” he insists and Martín snorts.

“Of course not. You’re not even Greek.”

Andrés sits up, reclining back onto the other end of the sofa. “No, but you can’t think the Romans were any different.”

“Oh I know you weren’t,” Martín says provocatively, just to make Andrés smile.

Daniel laughs. “I always forget how old you are, Andrés.”

Andrés nods, but doesn’t take his eyes off Martín. “It’s easier to forget when you’re not alone.”

-

Later, in the bedroom Andrés had insisted be theirs because of its spectacular view of the Vitava that ‘no one else would know to appreciate’, Martín lets Andrés press him into the mattress until every life they’ve lived until then, in a hundred different cities is, for the moment, a distant memory.

“I’m sorry,” he says afterward into Andrés’ neck. “I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I won’t try and leave you again. Never again.”

Andrés doesn't say anything, just clutches Martín close instead of pushing him away, which seems to be its own sort of forgiveness.

* * *

**New York 2015**

Martín wakes to the sound of screaming. Beside him, Andrés jerks awake too, looking disoriented for seconds before he grabs his gun from the bedside table. Martín follows him out of their room and into the hallway, looking for the source of the screams.

Mónica joins them moments later and as one they look towards Aníbal’s room. Andrés sighs, lowering his gun.

“I swear none of us were that bad after dying a couple of times,” Martín murmurs.

Andrés sighs. “Well, you were drunk your first few decades, weren’t you? Besides, none of us were captured and killed over and over again by the Spanish government.”

“True,” Martín says, trying not to think of the state Aníbal was in, when they found him. “Should we try and wake him?”

“I’ll go,” Mónica says, walking past them and opening the door to Aníbal’s bedroom, his screams having petered out into pained whimpers.

Martín watches her disappear and listens to the sound of her softly soothing their newest recruit for a moment, before tugging Andrés back to their room. He crawls under the covers and immediately wraps himself around Andrés when he joins him, desperate to regain some of the warmth that he’d been robbed of by the cold night air.

“Four hundred years and your feet are still like blocks of ice,” Andrés teases and Martín pokes him hard enough to make him let out an undignified yelp.

“Four hundred years and you’re still an asshole.”

Andrés covers Martín’s mouth with one large hand. “Hush, I’m trying to sleep.”

Just for that, Martín bites him, which then devolves into a fight, which ends with them decidedly not fighting and instead looks to be going somewhere infinitely more interesting – that is until the phone rings.

“Don’t you dare answer that,” Martín threatens from where he’s slid halfway down Andrés body.

Andrés looks at him regretfully. “It’s Sergio.”

Martín scowls and presses a kiss to Andrés hipbone. “Tell your brother I hate him.”

“Sergio, what’s wrong?” Andrés answers the phone, one hand curling under Martín’s chin.

Martín sighs and shuffles back up the bed to rest his head on Andrés’ chest.

Andrés nods, even though Sergio can’t see him, listening intently. “You’ve found her? You’re sure?”

He pauses as he waits for Sergio’s answer. “Alright. Yes, I’ll tell them. Are you coming here or should we start packing?”

Martín sighs as Andrés starts playing with his hair.

“Okay, well, Mónica will be pleased at least. I’ll see you in a few days, hermanito.”

Andrés groans once he hangs up, throwing his phone carelessly onto the nightstand.

“What’s happening?” Martín asks.

“Sergio needs us to come back to Spain. He found her, the one we’ve been dreaming of. Her name is Silene, she and her boyfriend were fatally shot when robbing a bank – only she got back up again. Sergio picked her up before the police could,” Andrés explains.

Martín yawns. “Good, I’m glad they found her. We don’t have to leave tonight, do we?”

Andrés shakes his head. “No, we’ll book flights out tomorrow morning.”

“Alright,” Martín says, curling closer to the other man. “Good night, mi amor.”

He feels Andrés reposition himself slightly for sleeping and tug the covers more securely over them before pressing a kiss to the top of Martín’s head.

“Good night.”


	3. a mouth that i would kill to kiss

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> drinking in vienna, baths in munich, and speeches in the mint

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> same as before but here are the TWs: canon-typical violence, referenced suicide attempt, implied smut, period-typical homphobia, referenced historical homophobia, temporary character death

**Vienna 1664**

It was a relatively short war, as wars go. Sergio had seen too many of them over the centuries, only slightly less than Andrés, but more than Martín, and certainly more than their new recruit.

Mirko died three times before they found him, a Serb serving in the Austro-Hungarian army. He was intimidating to look at, bearded and tattooed like Sergio has only seen sailors, but it belies his kind heart.

The house they’re in isn’t up to Andrés’ usual standard, which is why he’s pouting at the kitchen table while Martín plies him with wine. Mirko though, he had looked at it like it was a palace, and even now is hunched appreciatively over the fire like he hasn’t been warm in a while – it’s probably the aftereffects of drowning, Sergio finds them hard to shake too.

Martín sets the bottle of wine on the table with a loud thunk and Mirko looks over at him. Andrés laughs into his wine at something Martín says and Martín leans over the table to kiss him. Mirko’s eyes widen and Sergio clears his throat uncomfortably.

“Are they always like that?” Mirko asks, voice soft, not disgusted as Sergio had expected.

He shrugs. “For the last three decades or so.”

Mirko nods and stays silent for a moment. “They look… like they’re married.”

“They are,” Sergio replies. “Well, not in the eyes of God or any European kingdom. But Andrés doesn’t really recognise any kings anyway.”

“Or gods,” Martín says, walking over to them, hand clasped in Andrés’.

Sergio snorts. “Only because he considers himself one.”

Andrés smirks as he sits on the daybed, tugging Martín down with him. Sergio watches Mirko as he watches Martín and Andrés curl around each other. He doesn’t look angry or appalled like Sergio has seen other men look at his brother. Mirko just looks sad, a kind of longing in his eyes that Sergio recognises in himself.

“So,” Mirko says slowly in what is their only common language so far - German which isn’t Sergio’s favourite. “When did you get married?”

Andrés smiles. “In 1641 in the Notre-Dame cathedral in Paris.”

“You got married in a cathedral?” Mirko asks. “The church allowed this?”

“Fuck no,” Martín says with a laugh. “The church has no say over our love.”

Mirko looks to Sergio for help.

“They broke in and Andrés blackmailed a priest into marrying them.”

“A horrible little man,” Martín says. “He told us we’d burn in hell for desecrating a house of god.”

“Well you didn’t have to consummate the marriage right there in the confessional,” Sergio says, pinching the bridge of his nose.

To his surprise, Mirko laughs loudly, looking between Andrés and Martín, who looks delighted at the mirthful attention.

“Was the priest still there?” he asks and both Martín and Andrés laugh.

“No,” Andrés says. “That moment was between Martín, me, and the guards who chased us out eventually.”

“You’re very good at running with your breeches around your knees,” Martín says fondly, leaning his head against Andrés’ chest.

A kiss is pressed to his hair and Andrés smiles down at him. “And you’re very good at distracting guards, but don’t worry, I won’t tell anyone how.”

Sergio sighs and turns to Mirko. “Sure you want to put up with this for eternity?”

Mirko nods. “Yes. It is… nice to see men love normally, openly, even if it is only in front of family – and me.”

Something in Martín’s face softens as he looks at Mirko and he disentangles himself from Andrés to take Mirko’s hand.

“You are our family, hermano,” he insists. “You, me, Andrés and Sergio. We’re all we have and we look after each other.”

Mirko squeezes his hand and smiles. “Thank you, it means a lot. Has it always been just you three?”

Sergio’s stomach turns to ice and Martín shakes his head.

“No,” Andrés answers. “There was someone else, before Martín joined us. She… she died.”

“I thought we can’t die?” Mirko asks.

“We can,” Sergio says sharply.

Martín sighs and pats Mirko’s shoulder. “Her name was Raquel. She died before I became immortal. She was older even than Andrés.”

“What happened to her?” Mirko asks and Sergio can feel the weight of his gaze.

“One day she just didn’t heal,” Andrés says. “She was younger then than I am now. Four centuries on Earth and one day she was just gone.”

“We don’t know why,” Sergio says, anticipating the question that Mirko is going to ask. “She said it was her time, but we’re older now so there can’t be a time limit.”

Mirko bows his head. “So we die many times over, and we don’t know which will be the last? Is this a blessing or a curse?”

“It’s time for more wine,” Martín says, disappearing into the other room, ostensibly in search of the alcohol, but Sergio knows when Andrés follows him, that it’s more than that.

“He doesn’t like thinking about it,” Sergio says quietly, staring into the fire. “Andrés is six hundred years older than him, they’ve had a fraction of that together.”

He hears Mirko shift, shuffling closer. “He’s afraid of his time coming, of being Raquel?”

Sergio laughs bitterly. “No, he’s afraid of being me, of being the one left behind.”

“Is it hard… to do this alone?” Mirko asks and Sergio wants to reassure him, but he’s spent two hundred years without Raquel and he can’t lie to their new brother.

“Yes,” he admits. “It’s hard. But we’re not alone.”

There’s a noise from the other room, glass breaking, and Mirko looks over his shoulder. “But we don’t have what they have.”

Sergio snorts. “No. Thankfully we don’t. I highly recommend you and I go find a tavern now, they’re going to be loud and they don’t care all that much who hears.”

Mirko laughs and gets to his feet, offering Sergio a hand up. “I was in the army, I’ve heard worse.”

They wrap their cloaks around themselves and head out into the street where night is rapidly falling.

“I really doubt it,” Sergio says. “Come on, I know a place.”

* * *

**Madrid 2016**

Andrés paces back and forth in front of Tokyo and Denver. Denver looks nervous, Tokyo defiant. From where he’s lounging on the warehouse stairs, Martín just looks bored.

“What in the hell happened to you two? Were you dropped on your heads as children?” Andrés demands and Martín cracks a smile. “Have your recent revivals left you without sufficient brain cells?”

“Berlin,” Denver tries, but he’s cut off.

“Because I fail to see why else you would both act so stupidly,” Andrés interrupts. “You, Tokyo, seem to have forgotten that we are immortal and if Rio acts like an idiot and gets shot, then it doesn’t fucking matter!”

Tokyo juts her chin out. “I was protecting the gang.”

Martín barks a laugh and Andrés scowls at her. “You weren’t protecting anything, you lost your head and started firing at the fucking police. As a result, you got Martín killed.”

“He’s fine,” Tokyo scoffs and Andrés shoots her in the stomach.

She collapses onto the ground, hands clutching at her belly, blood spilling between her fingers. Denver yells, dropping to his knees beside her as Andrés steps forward.

“It still hurts, doesn’t it?” he asks as Tokyo yowls in pain. “He was in pain because of you. He died because of you. I had to watch it happen and wait for him to revive, because of you. He is mine and you do not get to take him from me, because I have killed everyone who ever tried.”

“Andrés,” Martín calls, tone warning. “That’s enough. Put her out of her misery.”

Andrés smiles and does just that, putting a bullet right between Tokyo’s eyes. Denver groans when blood splatters his knees.

“Are you going to kill me too?” he asks, looking up at Andrés. “Mónica gets upset when I die without her.”

There’s a smirk on Andrés’ face, but he shakes his head and puts the gun back in his holster. “No, letting you think you might die was your punishment. After all, you only got a hostage shot – and one I don’t particularly care for at that. Although why you had to drag them all onto the roof because one of the old guys felt unwell is a mystery to me.”

“That’s because you have empathy issues, mi amor,” Martín tells him with a fond smile.

Denver looks at Tokyo who has stopped bleeding and sighs. “He reminded me of my father, I just wanted to help him.”

“Next time, don’t,” Andrés orders. “Now come on, we need to go, the surgeons are on their way.” Tokyo sits up gasping for air and Andrés kicks her knee. “You too, come on.”

She groans, swearing under her breath and Denver helps her up. Andrés leaves them to it, walking up the stairs and collecting Martín on the way, who slots himself under his arm. Four centuries and he’s never tired of how effortlessly they fit together.

The surgeons are being let in when they arrive, separating just before they step into view of the hostages. Andrés exchanges a look with Martín as they walk closer to where Arturo is lying on a table whimpering. One of the men who came in is obviously police.

“I thought we requested only doctors, not the butchers who shot our dear Arturito,” Andrés says, smiling at the big guy.

“I’m a nurse,” the man insists.

Martín steps up to him, standing toe to toe with him even though he’s about two heads shorter. “Are you really? Then how about we let you do the surgery alone? If you’re such a good nurse, then surely you can do it without any help.”

The surgeon forces himself between them. “He’s a nurse, there’s no way he could do this surgery. Now can I please treat my patient – or do you want him to die?”

Andrés shrugs. “I don’t really care that much either way. But I’ve been told hostages dying is bad for business, so by all means please proceed.”

Martín laughs and the police officer scowls at him. “You think that’s funny? This man could die and it would be on your hands.”

“I’m not the one who shot him,” Martín says with a smirk.

The officer moves before Andrés can stop him, snatching a scalpel up off the table and grabbing the front of Martín’s jumpsuit. Martín goes still in his grasp as the scalpel is held to his throat and Andrés draws his gun.

“Let go of him,” he orders and the police officer laughs.

“Not so confident now, are we?” he taunts and Andrés smiles.

“Oh I’m still confident. Confident that you will suffer a very unpleasant death if you don’t put down the scalpel and let go of him.”

The police officer looks around, sees Rio, Helsinki, and Nairobi also pointing guns at him, sees Tokyo and Denver arriving and immediately drawing their weapons too. Slowly the officer releases Martín and throws the scalpel back onto the table, immediately raising his hands. Martín stumbles away from him and Andrés grabs him, steadying him with the hand not holding his pistol.

“Are you okay?” he asks as Helsinki and Tokyo grab the police officer, restraining his arms.

Martín nods, shivering when Andrés strokes a thumb over his unblemished neck.

“Can I start now?” the surgeon asks impatiently. “Are you done?”

Andrés holds up a finger. “I’m making sure he’s okay.”

The police officer rolls his eyes. “What, is he your boyfriend? He’s fine.”

The surgeon sniggers and Andrés glares at them, feeling cold fury in his gut.

“You’re a child. An infant, your mocking is thus infantile,” he tells the men who have lived for what is only the blink of an eye to him. “He is not my boyfriend. This man is more to me than you can dream. He’s the moon when I’m lost in darkness and warmth when I shiver in cold. And his kiss still thrills me, even after half a millennium.”

In front of him, Martín is staring at him with that look in his eyes that tells Andrés he could hear this a thousand times and still not fully believe it. “He has a spirit and an intelligence of which this world is not worthy and I would bring the universe to its knees for him. I love this man beyond measure and reason. He is not my boyfriend… He is all and he is more.”

“You incurable fucking romantic,” Martín says, dragging him into a kiss.

“Go ahead and start your surgery now,” Nairobi says when they break apart to find the surgeon just staring at them.

Arturo groans pitifully from the table and Andrés grins down at him. “Come now, Arturito, it could be worse. The police could have shot you in the head.”

“At least then he wouldn’t have had to see that,” Denver grumbles as the surgeon finally gets to work.

Nairobi laughs at him. “How much money do you owe Helsi?”

“Too much,” Helsinki says. “You should know by now not to bet against me.”

“Well how was I supposed to know Berlin would do the speech for the surgeon and not the whole police force when we’re escaping?” Denver whines.

“You bet on us?” Martín asks with a frown. “Again? I’ve told you to stop doing that if you’re not going to let me in it.”

“No because then you try and rig it,” Nairobi points out and Andrés pats Martín’s side when he scowls.

“Sorry, hermanito,” Helsinki tells Denver. “I’ve known them longer and there’s no way Berlin was going to wait until the heist is nearly over to do the speech.”

“Wait he’s done that before?” Tokyo asks incredulously.

Nairobi sighs. “About once every couple of years.”

“I do it when it’s necessary,” Andrés insists and Helsinki laughs outright.

“Is it ever really necessary?” Denver asks, blanching when Andrés glares at him.

Martín wraps an arm around Andrés’ waist. “I like it.”

* * *

**Munich 1634**

Martín thanks the maid who has just finished pouring the final bucket of water into the tub in front of the fireplace. She curtsies and leaves the room, head bowed. He strips, throwing his clothes over the delicate screen. He climbs in the bath, wincing at the sudden heat and slides down until he’s submerged up to his chin. The tub is relatively big, but he can’t quite stretch out his legs, so his knees stick up above the water.

“Times like these, I miss the hammam Sergio and I used to go to in Istanbul,” a voice says and Martín startles, sending water sloshing over the edge of the bath.

“Don’t you knock?” he asks Andrés, letting annoyance tinge his voice.

Andrés suddenly appears in front of him, having ignored the privacy screen entirely it seems. He’s shed his doublet and his linen shirt is mostly unlaced. Martín can’t stop himself from staring at the long expanse of Andrés’ neck which is cast in rosy hues by the firelight.

“Do I need to knock?” Andrés asks, settling onto a chair beside the fire.

“I’d say you do, if you don’t want to see me naked, but apparently we’re past that,” Martín says coolly, refusing to blush when Andrés smirks at him, running his eyes along Martín’s submerged body.

“Well, we’ve known each other for four years now, we might know each other in the future for five-hundred times that. Some might think it strange if we don’t see each other naked even once in that time.”

Martín laughs. “Some might say that those are ungodly words Andrés, and that men weren’t meant to see each other in that way.”

“Pff, those people aren’t artists, they have no appreciation for the physical form,” Andrés says dismissively and then his mouth curls into a smirk. “Besides, you don’t strike me as a particularly godly man.”

Martín looks away, breaking the eye contact and sinks further into the bath. Andrés leans forward and braces his forearms on the tub.

“It’s been four years, Martín, isn’t it time you tell me?”

“Tell you what?” Martín asks, sitting upright and moving forward himself.

Andrés smiles. “Oh, I think you do. Munich isn’t that big, people talk. They talked in Palermo too. What exactly did you do with all those sailors?”

He’s still smiling and not in the way any of the men who tried to kill Martín for his preferences would, so Martín smirks at him.

“Well Andrés, we can’t all have thirty wives.”

The other man laughs, head thrown back. “It's seventeen now, actually.”

Martín raises his eyebrows. “My mistake. Well, then you know. You have women for ten, fifteen years until you get bored or they notice you don’t age and I – I have sailors and aristocrats and men drunk enough not to care for one night.”

Andrés sits back, smile still on his face but it’s lost the teasing edge. “Isn’t that terribly lonely?”

There’s something strange about the way he says it, like he’s concerned and dispassionate at the same time. His wrists are crossed on the edge of the tub, hands dangling limply so that his fingertips are just brushing the water near Martín’s waist.

“I don’t know,” Martín says eventually. “It’s something, isn’t it? Better than nothing.”

“Is it?”

Martín doesn’t do this, he doesn’t take risks. He goes to safe taverns and lordlings about whom the rumours are practically fact and he lets the men at the docks approach him. But Andrés… Martín dreamt of him every night for sixty-two years. They’ve travelled together for the last four, they’ll continue to do so until the earth ends or they do. And Martín has never loved anyone but himself, except that sometime between dreaming Andrés and living with him, he’s come to love him fiercely.

“Andrés,” he says softly and then he’s reaching out for the other man, pulling his face towards him.

Their mouths meet once, briefly in the slightest brush of lips and when Andrés doesn’t pull away, Martín tries again. He kisses Andrés properly this time, fingers curling in his long hair, tongue pressing its way inside his mouth. Andrés groans and Martín pulls him closer until he’s more in the bath with him than out of it, shirt soaked through with lukewarm water.

“Andrés,” he breathes against the other man’s neck when they part. “Andrés I think… I think I love you.”

A hand strokes the back of his head, a kiss is pressed to his cheek and then Andrés is pulling away. He gets to his feet, standing by the fire, shirt dripping onto the flagstones and Martín shivers, alone in the water.

“Martín, I’m sorry,” Andrés says. “But I think you and I want different things. I’m still married, you know this.”

“To a woman whom you’ve known for six months and will leave again in a year!” Martín insists, turning his face away to hide his tears.

Andrés sighs and Martín hears him move closer, before his hand reaches out to cup Martín’s chin.

“If I could return your feelings, I would querido. Some things just aren’t meant to be.”

Andrés’ other hand brushes away the tears on Martín’s cheeks and Martín can’t help but lean into the touch, however brief.

“Why did you come here tonight?” Martín asks as Andrés retreats behind the screen. “Why did you come here and ask those things? Why did you let me kiss you?”

Andrés’s footsteps stop. “I had to see if Sergio was right.”

“Right about what?” Martín asks, voice cracking embarrassingly as he presses his palms to his eyes.

There’s a long silence before Andrés finally replies. “Right about us.”

His footsteps signal his departure and the door closes softly behind him. Martín looks down at his hands, skin shrivelled up by the water and curls them into fists hard enough to draw blood from crescent-shaped cuts that heal instantly. He slides down in the tub so that his head is underwater and screams until he drowns.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hope you liked this - and can forgive me for bastardising joe and nicky's beautiful speech (but martín's heart really doesn't overflow with kindness for the world lol)!! i'll be back with the last two chapters soon! (i hope)


	4. a (good) man hurts you and you know you hurt him too

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> explosive times in rio, an agreement in copenhagen, a revelation in the mint

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> TWs: same as before violence wise, descriptions of major injuries, reference to homophobia based attacks

**Rio de Janeiro 1743**

Somewhere between their third and fourth honeymoon, Sergio moves out. Martín doesn’t care as much about that as he does about the fact that Sergio is taking Mirko with him.

“I’ll miss you,” he tells Mirko, arms wrapped around his solid waist.

Mirko pats his back and behind him, Andrés rolls his eyes. “Mi amor, you’ll see Mirko again in two months – three at the most.”

“Shut up,” Martín says, and he can feel Mirko shrug apologetically.

“I’ll miss you too, hermano,” Mirko tells him and with another pat on the back, he disentangles himself from Martín’s embrace.

Sergio, who has been watching them from the door, eyes Martín warily. “You’re not going to hug me like that, are you?”

Martín laughs. “Nope.”

Andrés does exchange a brief hug with his brother before he goes though and soon the two are swinging themselves onto horses and leaving the little house they’ve purchased and Andrés and Martín behind them.

“I really am going to miss him,” Martín sighs. “Not Sergio though.”

Andrés rolls his eyes again and slings an arm around his waist, guiding Martín back inside. “You’re a terror.”

“Hmm, that’s not what you said when I was convincing you to let Sergio go away on his own,” Martín teases, letting Andrés tug him through the kitchen, into the only other room in the building – which Andrés proclaimed was a shack that can barely be considered a house – the bedroom.

“I can’t believe you spent so much on this bed,” Andrés says, frowning at the intricately carved wooden frame. He sits down on it and then grins. “Then again, I appreciate the effort you’ve gone to.”

“That’s sort of what I thought you’d say,” Martín replies, climbing onto Andrés lap and pushing him onto his back.

Andrés reaches up, one hand settling on the back of Martín’s neck. He smiles, opens his mouth to speak, and then the world around them explodes in fire and splintering wood.

-

Martín’s ears are ringing, a high-pitched noise that feels like it’s piercing his brain. He lifts a numb hand to his face and finds it sticky with blood. He forces himself to sit up, peeling himself off the floor even as the destroyed room swims around him nauseatingly. Two walls are missing completely, one still smouldering and the roof has half-collapsed on the bed where it seems he’d been sitting only moments ago.

“Andrés?” he calls, choking on the gunpowder he can still taste in the air. “Andrés?”

He can’t even hear himself yelling, isn’t sure any sound is coming out, so there’s no way he’ll be able to hear Andrés even if he is replying. He tries to get to his feet, pulling himself upright with a dresser that has miraculously remained mostly intact.

There’s a searing pain in his right calf and he groans when he looks down and sees a piece of wood the width of his arm sticking out of it. It hurts but he decides not to pull it out, even as he feels his body trying to heal around it. He looks around and can’t see Andrés anywhere. Gritting his teeth, he limps across the room towards the rubble covered bed. There’s bits of brick and what used to be the main support beam of the roof lying in a pile and something that makes his breath catch in his chest tells him that Andrés is underneath it all. He starts digging, ignoring how the sharp materials cut into his hands. He has one goal and that’s to get to Andrés before he revives and wakes to find himself trapped.

Too long, it takes too long and too many minutes of digging through layers of broken shingles and wood and stone to reach something that may be Andrés. He pushes the final layer of rubble aside and two eyes meet his.

“Andrés,” he says and it’s clear from the pain glazing the other man’s eyes that he’s been alive this whole time.

He surveys Andrés’ crushed body, trying to assess the damage. Certainly he’s broken bones and punctured organs – that he’s still alive is a miracle – and there, jutting through his torso is a large, jagged chunk of wood. It makes the one in Martín’s leg look like a fucking splinter. Andrés coughs and blood sprays across his chin.

“Fuck,” Martín mutters to himself. His hands shake as he reaches for Andrés’ face, steadying his lolling head. “Andrés, mi amor, I need to pull the wood out of your chest, okay? So let go now. Let go so it won’t hurt anymore and you can heal.”

Andrés coughs again and shakes his head. He mumbles something that might be a disagreement but there’s not really enough air in his lungs to force any sound out.

“Andrés please, or I’m going to have to do it,” Martín says.

He doesn’t get a reply, just Andrés’ wavering gaze holding his as best he can. It’s the closest he’ll get to consent. His hands move tenderly over Andrés’ face and down to his neck. He can feel Andrés’ pulse fluttering weakly under the skin. He hates having to do this – he had to shoot Mirko once to get him to stop struggling while Andrés and Sergio got him out of the noose he was hanging from – but most of all he hates having to do this to Andrés.

He takes a deep breath and pinches Andrés’ nose, clamping his hand over his mouth. Beneath him, Andrés struggles instinctively, but he can’t even lift his arms properly. When Martín runs out of air, having held his breath himself, he starts breathing again and keeps his hands over Andrés’ mouth.

When he pulls his hands away, he feels bile rise up in his throat, seeing Andrés lifeless below him. Tears sting in his eyes, but he has to pull himself together. He shuffles away from Andrés’ slack, staring face, and towards his impaled torso. He doesn’t mess about and pulls the wood straight out of Andrés’ stomach. It’s followed by a worrying amount of blood, but Martín doesn’t even bother trying to staunch it.

Instead, he finally deals with his own leg, yanking the wood from his calf with a barely suppressed yowl. It’s a relief to have the wood out though and he can feel the muscle and flesh start to knit themselves back together, finally unimpeded. He crouches over Andrés and finds him still passed out, but thankfully alive again. He knows it will cause Andrés more pain, but he has to get him moved, so he gets his arms under Andrés’ shoulders and ruined legs and picks him up, staggering to the demolished wall.

Andrés stirs in his arms and Martín hopes he stays unconscious until he can set him down somewhere moderately comfortable. He hears voices and then Mirko and Sergio come sprinting into view.

“Martín!” Mirko bellows “We heard the explosion, are you alright?”

“I’m okay, but Andrés…”

Mirko steps through the ruins of their south wall and helps Martín with Andrés’ weight. Together they get him far enough away from the house to lower him into some soft grass under a tree. His fractures are starting to heal, Martín can tell that much, but he can also still see through him – his body is struggling to heal the massive wound.

“What happened?” Martín asks, turning to Sergio for answers.

Sergio sighs, collapsing onto the ground beside his brother. “Powder kegs behind the house that were set off. I think it might be retaliation for what we did to the sugarcane plantation.”

Mirko curses. “I knew it was too risky to stay here.”

“Yes well, nothing we can do about that now, is there?” Martín asks, cradling Andrés head on his lap, silently willing him to wake up.

Someone must have been listening to his half-prayer because Andrés’ eyelids flutter and he starts to move.

“Shh, stay still,” Martín murmurs. “You’re still healing.”

Andrés’ face twists. “Hurts. Fucking hate bombs.”

He hisses when Mirko gently probes the edges of his wound and Martín moves his hands off Andrés’ face to bat Mirko away.

“We’ll move as soon as you’re healed,” Sergio tells Andrés. “You and Martín can ride in the cart with the luggage and we’ll sit up front. There’s no sense in staying here for them to find you when they come back to check their handiwork.”

Andrés has his eyes closed again so Martín nods their agreement for him. “Alright Sergio. I know you two were going to stay in the colonies, but maybe we should try and go back to Europe for a bit.”

“Africa,” Andrés interjects weakly. “It’s warm.”

Sergio nods and Martín kisses Andrés’ brow. “Whatever you want, mi amor.”

* * *

**Copenhagen 1635**

Things have changed. Andrés knows they have, knows it’s his fault. But he also knows it won’t be easy to fix them. The kiss in the bathtub… it was an experiment, a temptation he never should have given into – and one he can’t stop thinking about.

Every time he’s near him, he feels Martín’s breath hitching against his lips, feels his bath-damp curls under his hands. Nowadays though, he almost never sees Martín – he hardly spends any time in the house since they left Munich to travel here. He’s always out, a new man every evening, returning to the house wine sodden, with roughed up clothes, ignoring Andrés when he tries to catch his eye.

The only time they got close to talking was the day before they left Munich. Most of the house had been packed up and Andrés was still recovering from the knife-wound he’d goaded a drunk into inflicting to dissolve his current marriage when Martín stumbled home.

“What happened to you?” he’d asked, eyeing the bloodstain on Andrés’ shirt.

Andrés shrugged. “Mugging gone wrong. Had to end things with Tatiana and it’s better if she thinks I’m dead.”

“Poor woman,” Martín said atonally.

“She’s young,” Andrés replied. “She can remarry.”

Martín pushed past him, heading for the stairs. “So can you.”

“Martín.” Andrés reached out and caught Martín’s wrist in his hand.

He paused, tension radiating from his body. “What?”

“I know what you think of me – and of my wives,” Andrés said. “But I care about them and I care about you. And I miss all of them as I miss you too.”

“I don’t know what you want from me,” Martín admitted.

Andrés tugged on his wrist. “I know you’re still angry, but it’s been weeks – can we forget about that, about what I did. I want to be friends again, Martín.”

“No,” Martín had pulled his hand free and continued up the staircase without looking back.

Andrés shakes himself from his recollections and looks down at the sketches he’d been working on by candlelight – the tranquil lake scene he’d started had, against his will, turned into a study of Martín’s hands. He hears a noise out by the front door and starts, sweeping the sketches off the table and into a drawer. It’s late, long after midnight, and usually Martín would be home by now. He grabs his dagger from the bureau, pulls on his boots and carefully moves towards the door.

He unlatches it and the door swings open as if by its own accord. Before Andrés can step out, Martín falls through the doorway, bruised and bloodied, and would have collapsed straight onto the floor if Andrés hadn’t caught him.

“Shit,” he groans as Andrés struggles to keep him upright.

“Martín!” he exclaims. “What happened to you?”

Martín makes a pained noise and extricates himself from Andrés’ arms. “Nothing.”

“Nothing?” Andrés repeats incredulously. He gestures at Martín’s ripped shirt and the blood he can see drying underneath it. “This is not nothing. Someone hurt you. Who was it and why?”

He reaches for Martín, who evades his hands. “It was a romantic encounter gone wrong, alright? Just… spare me your judgement or your pity. I’m too tired to listen to a lecture right now.”

Martín stomps away from him, his boots leaving damp marks on the floor. Andrés watches him go, feeling frustrated and impotent in a way he has come to know all too well since Martín joined their group. He has no desire to go back to his sketching, so he might as well retire. He follows the trail Martín left behind up the stairs and to the sleeping quarters.

Andrés’ room is situated to the left of Sergio’s, which is sandwiched between his and Martín’s. He stops for a minute, between Sergio and Martín’s rooms, to see if he can hear either of them. There’s the sound of faint snoring from his brother’s room and Andrés allows himself a moment to be thankful for his continued presence in his life. There’s no noise from Martín’s room. Andrés raises his hand to knock, then thinks better of it. Martín doesn’t want to see him.

He turns and retreats to his own bedroom, changing quickly into his nightclothes before getting into bed. It’s not the most comfortable place he’s ever slept, but there have also been much, much worse places – times where he, Sergio, and Raquel had gone months without sleeping indoors, where their clothes had grown mouldy from the constant damp. He had always complained the most – for all intents and purposes they were gods, why should they cower in the woods instead of living it up in the cities?

He rolls onto his side and the bed creaks, joining the cacophony of noises the house makes at night. If Andrés cared about sleep any less, he’d let it keep him awake. As it is, he’s almost drifted off when there’s the sound of the floorboards bending under careful footsteps and his door opens. He’s half risen, the knife he keeps under his pillow in his hand, when he hears Martín’s voice.

“Andrés,” he says quietly.

It’s dark, all the candles extinguished, with only the burned down embers in the fireplace providing any sort of light. Martín is barely more than a shadow as he hovers in the doorway.

“Martín,” Andrés whispers. “Is everything okay?”

He thinks Martín nods before he speaks, but he can’t be sure. “Remember our last night in Munich?”

“Of course. You said you couldn’t forget your anger,” Andrés replies, keeping his voice even despite his uncertainty at what’s happening.

“I’m still angry,” Martín says, but his voice isn’t as sharp as it has been recently when he's spoken to Andrés. “I’m so mad at you for what you did and how you manipulated me. But…”

He trails off and Andrés sits up further. “But?”

Martín audibly sighs. “But you said you miss me and I’m tired and cold and sore because some bastards beat the shit out of me and I miss being friends with you too.”

“Martín,” Andrés says softly. “Do you want to stay here tonight?”

He doesn’t receive a verbal response but then the shadow that is Martín, has crossed the room and is sliding into the other side of the bed. Andrés lies back down next to him and when Martín unsubtly shuffles closer, he wraps his arms around him.

“Thank you,” Martín says. “I’m glad we can be friends again.”

Andrés nods even though Martín can’t see him. “Yes,” he murmurs. “Friends.”

* * *

**Madrid 2016**

“They’re sending someone to do a welfare check on the hostages,” Sergio tells Andrés on the phone.

Martín is sitting close enough to Andrés that he can hear every word coming through the tinny little speakers and exchanges a confused glance with him.

“Now?” he mouths and Andrés repeats the question to Sergio.

“Hermanito, we’re almost done – do we really need to give in to this delaying tactic?”

There’s a pause and then Sergio’s voice can be heard again. “I think it might be smart. If we let them in, make it seem like we have no intention of leaving soon, then they’ll be caught off guard when we start the escape tomorrow.”

“Who are they sending?” Andrés queries.

“I don’t know.” Sergio sounds irritated by the admission. “I’m assuming Ángel Rubio – the one they sent in as a nurse. But they’ve just got in more backup from Barcelona. I don’t know if they’ll send in one of them, since they’re fresh faces.”

“Okay,” Andrés says. “Well, we’ll deal with it.”

Sergio sighs loudly. “Alright, I’ll use the opportunity to go back to the Toledo house, make sure they’re taking the bait – so drag it out, Berlin.”

“Will do, I’ll talk to you in six hours, hermanito. Palermo and I will take care of whoever the police sends.”

Andrés hangs up the phone and Martín raises his eyebrows. “Sergio doesn’t know something… That’s interesting.”

“Yes,” Andrés says consideringly. “He’s worried about it.”

“Are you?” Martín asks.

Andrés smirks. “No.”

“Then let’s go meet the policeman we need to keep busy.”

Martín lets Andrés kiss him and then follows him out to find the others.

-

Andrés reclines against the banister of the main staircase, looking completely at his leisure when the doors to the bank start to open. He descends slowly and Martín exchanges a look with Helsinki who rolls his eyes.

“He can’t help himself, can he?” he asks and Martín laughs.

“Nope.”

The doors finally open completely and the inspector comes striding in. It’s not Ángel Rubio, but a woman. She’s shorter than Martín, with long red hair, and she’s wearing a grey trouser-suit that fits her well. Andrés has just reached the bottom of the stairs and Martín waits for him to speak – to start his little game that he’s been waiting to play.

Except Andrés doesn’t speak, frozen with one foot on the foyer floor and one still on the stairs. Martín throws Helsinki a half panicked, half confused look and rushes down the steps towards Andrés.

He touches his waist cautiously. “Berlin? Shouldn’t we welcome the inspector?”

Andrés’ entire body remains tense under his touch. “No,” he says, voice tense. “She’s not an inspector. She’s not with the police.”

“What?” Martín looks between Andrés and the red-headed woman who is eyeing them both cautiously. “Mi amor, what are you talking about?” he asks in an undertone.

The woman steps forward and Martín’s hand goes to his gun, but she ignores him. “Andrés,” she says quietly.

Martín’s head snaps round to look at Andrés. Andrés is paler than he’s ever seen him, dark eyes glittering with emotion.

“Martín,” he says hoarsely. “Martín this is Raquel.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> lol, remember when i said i'd update and then waited three months - anywho hope you liked this chapter, i won't leave the final one this long

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you liked this?! if you have any moments that you'd like to see from the boys' past or even involving any other gang members, drop them here or on my social medial!!  
> Next chapter, expect more mint stuff and more backstory!
> 
> Come yell at me on tumblr ([@hefellfordean](https://hefellfordean.tumblr.com)) or twitter ([@angstypalermo](https://twitter.com/angstypalermo))


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